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The Forum > Article Comments > Rewriting Easter Island's history > Comments

Rewriting Easter Island's history : Comments

By Mark S. Lawson, published 1/8/2011

Would Jared Diamond's theories escape critical scrutiny if he wasn't a hero of the global warming movement?

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Mark,

so why did you refer to abuse then in your response to me? I repeat. i did not abuse anybody including Plimer and Carter. And how can i apply a double standard when all i was asking was that you apply the same standards of analysis to two other climate writers. If your analysis of Diamond is correct then i'm inclined to agree with you about him.

You still have not answered my questions re consistency. You still use Diamond as a trojan horse to attack those who support human induced climate change. You attack him to get at them.

Here's an idea: why don't you apply your investigative rigour to the work of Howard Brady? or are you afraid of the outcome?
Posted by shal, Tuesday, 2 August 2011 4:16:08 PM
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Jared Diamond is a geographer, not an archaeologist. To a large extent, he is simply reporting on the work of others. There are certainly mistakes in his book, and Diamond may have been badly served by his editor, who should have been doing fact checking on matters outside his area of expertise. However, none of the authors of his sources have been jumping up and down claiming that Diamond misrepresented them.

It should hardly be news that people outbreed their resources, overexploit their environment, and then try to drive off or kill their neighbours to take what they have. We saw it happen in Rwanda on our television screens in 1994.

http://atlismta.org/online-journals/0607-journal-development-challenges/the-environment-and-conflict-in-the-rwandan-genocide/

Prof. Steven LeBlanc (Archaeology, Harvard) in his book "Constant Battles" and Prof. Lawrence Keeley (Archaeology, University of Chicago) in "War Before Civilization" have been saying much the same sorts of things as Jared Diamond, some of it based on first hand experience in excavations. Some of LeBlanc's ideas are discussed here

http://discovermagazine.com/2003/may/featwar

Another good source is "Dirt: the Erosion of Civilizations" by Prof. David Montgomery (Soil Science, University of Washington).

Contrary to Mollyduke, this article is more likely to be motivated by defending growthism in general, not just climate change scepticism. Growthists believe that limits to growth of population or consumption either don't exist (in defiance of all mathematical logic) or are so far in the future that we don't have to worry about them, which is challenged by the idea of collapse. If Diamond is a nutter, then so are all the archaeologists who apparently agree with him, or perhaps they have a parallel conspiracy to that of the climatologists, along with the geologists (peak oil, peak phosphate), hydrologists (depleted aquifers), agronomists (agricultural productivity not keeping up with population growth), oceanographers (acidification and dead zones in the oceans), biologists (extinctions, overfishing), and maybe even the physicists.

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/8155

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/8185
Posted by Divergence, Tuesday, 2 August 2011 4:40:16 PM
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Bugsy - actually that's true. It will just make the man more notorious. Just look at Paul Ehrlich, of Population Bomb fame. Completely wrong in all the forecasts he ever made, and he is revered. There is simply no justice in the world. Thanks for the information about the library copies.

Mollydukes - wow! that's the first time I've had Spinoza quoted at me. As for the business about weight of scientific evidence, as I pointed out before it is simply of no consequence in the debate. Whether 10 per cent or 90 per cent of scientists in a particular field agree on an issue has no bearing on whether its right or not. What actual forecasting track record can they point to? This point is instantly obvious to anyone family with the long and disasterous history of forecasting. Time for the rest of the community to catch up. The onus is on the experts to justify forecasts made with an incomplete knowledge of the system.

Shal - Your questions about Plimer et al have been answered in full.. I go where I can add value. Claiming that I'm unfiarly singling out one, big pile of nonsense because global warmers hate criticism of any kind of their their icons is absurd.

Divergence - while I admire your efforts to defend Diamond, you want to push your own line. That push would be more effective if you dumped Diamond altogether, rather than tried to defend him.

I'll read any responses but probably won't bother to respond after this. Thanks for the jousts fellas.
Posted by Curmudgeon, Tuesday, 2 August 2011 5:38:36 PM
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It's probably because Paul Ehrlich has also had a long scientific career and is the author or co-author on more than 300 scientific papers, mostly encompassing ecology. You know, some people actually read those in full, not just books and cherry-picked abstracts. Hard to believe, I know.

And he is an excellent and entertaining speaker. That tends to get you invited to dinner parties at least.
Posted by Bugsy, Tuesday, 2 August 2011 8:12:46 PM
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The important thing to consider is that the islanders adapted to their environment because of, among other things, the spread of disease, abductions, etc. It should also be noted how population stabilized.

Perhaps the same will happen to the global population as combinations of peak oil, chronic economic crisis, and environmental destruction take place. That is, we will be forced to adapt to these coupled with the spread of disease, resource wars, etc.
Posted by Monk, Tuesday, 2 August 2011 11:57:42 PM
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Hasbeen, LOL I know I need to get out more but I have Asperger Syndrome (AS) and I don’t do social stuff very well. But I do obsessive rational thought well and I’m bothered/obsessed by the seeming irrationality displayed by those who deny the science of climate change.

I don’t have any personal opinion about whether it is happening or not. I am not qualified to have any opinion on the science. What I am interested in, is that a particular group of people have chosen to deny that certain parts of science are not the best way of finding the ‘truth’ and this is an amazing way to behave, to me anyway.

Mark I do recommend Spinoza as a very interesting philosopher. What impresses me about him is that his life, the way he lived it, was consistent with his philosophy; he was not a hypocrite and even his philosophical‘enemies’ praised his behaviour. Things were different then perhaps.

But back to my obsession, on what basis can you dismiss the scientific consensus as being of no consequence! Surely, the authority of science has been the mainstay of our western culture. Science, as I understand it was founded on the white male belief in rationality and progress toward truth and I don’t understand why you have no problem in singling out one area of science and claiming that these particular scientific conclusions are wrong.

You refer to a ‘long and disastrous’ history of prediction but this is rhetoric – as my dictionary defines it; the use of exaggeration in an unfavourable sense. My understanding of science is that these failures of predictions and models are taken into account in the process of scientific validation of hypotheses. So why aren’t the scientists themselves responding to these failures?

If I can no longer depend on science to find what is right, what do I use?
Posted by Mollydukes, Wednesday, 3 August 2011 9:35:20 AM
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